Archive for the tag “advocacy”

There is a lot of understandable outrage from sexual assault and interpersonal violence advocates about the way they see assaults mishandled on college campuses. The criticism I hear most often is that since sexual assault/rape is a crime it should be handled by the police and the criminal justice system. They worry that a college will mishandle things or pressure a victim, and that the victim will not be able to avail herself of the criminal courts. As a result, they fear that the rapists and assaulters on campus will go free or, if they are punished they will get a slap on the wrist compared to what would happen if things were handled “correctly.”

Let’s be clear—recent history has given these advocates a lot of cause for concern. I have already discussed investigations about the way very prestigious schools have mishandled sexual assaults and the reporting of incidents, and those failures (along with the other anecdotal ones any advocate can tell you) have engendered an understandable belief that schools are actively (or at least negligently) silencing reports to make themselves look better. After all, they only have to report sexual assaults they know about so the less they know the fewer “occur,” and the safer their campus will seem to prospective students and their families. Since I do not know the actual story at any of these schools, I do not want to comment on their intention. I have already talked about how a bad system can hurt victims; however, the college judicial system is no worse than any other system and in some cases has distinct advantages for a victim. If you believe that the solution to the problems with some judicial systems on some campuses is to eliminate their ability to hear these cases, you will be hurting more victims that you help.

As a hypothetical, let’s say that a victim comes forward and says that she was sexually assaulted at a party in an off campus apartment. She says that she went there because she liked one of the guys that she knew from class, but since she was nervous she drank more than she normally does and got very drunk. While she remembers flirting with the guy she liked, she doesn’t remember much after she played a drinking game with “jungle juice” but that she woke up in his bed with him and knows they had sex. When she woke up and realized what happened, she freaked out because she would NEVER have had sex with him. In fact, she is known as a good girl, and that has made her somewhat of a challenge to the boys that know her. When the boy woke up he was being very nice as if nothing was wrong, and offered to take her to breakfast and asked if she would spend the day with him. She made up some excuse she can’t remember and went back to her dorm. A week later her RA brought her to the sexual assault advocate’s office when she heard what happened.

There are much more “horrific” cases that occur on a college campus, but do not be confused—this is sexual assault. Situations like this were the majority of cases that came to me as a judicial officer-ones where the extent of the sexual act was never a question, the victim and attacker knew each other (and often in a positive way prior to the assault), and alcohol was involved. In these cases a victim is often unsure about what she wants to happen to her attacker. There are times where she wants him thrown in jail, times where she wants him kicked off campus, and times where she only wants him to understand what he did to her so that she can “move on.” In fact, I have had more victims back out when they thought their attacker would be suspended or expelled than I have victims back out because of an uncertain outcome. So how do you advise her?

If she wants him held accountable there are three roads she can take. If she decides to go the criminal route she may be able to get him arrested, thrown in jail, and if the case is successful he may face time in prison. However, she has very little control over what happens in the case, it can take a long time, a victim is often kept out of the loop, and in the type of situation described above many DAs will not prosecute. She could decide to sue him, but this option is expensive and takes even longer. Finally, she could decide to bring him up on campus judicial charges. While this option would result in a much smaller consequence for the attacker (i.e., even if he’s expelled that’s much better than prison,) but the hearing will likely be confidential, she will be allowed to dictate much of what happens, and she can surround herself by the resources set aside for victims in these cases. That is at least true in good systems. Most importantly, if she chooses to use the campus judicial system she can still decide to use the other two because choosing that option does not in any way prevent her from changing her mind and also using the criminal or civil systems.

I know there are many survivors, victims, and advocates that don’t think the above benefits make the judicial system worth it, and will never accept that the system is “effective.” However, I think “effectiveness” should be defined by how a victim’s desired outcomes are met, and by the level to which a system can avoid revictimization. If you want to look at the systems based on their failures, none of them are “effective.” If you want to look at them by their successes, each of them can be. However, I believe that if you look at them as distinct and often not mutually exclusive options, the campus judicial system has the most potential to be victim-focused, minimize revictimization, and meet the victim’s desired goals to allow her to continue healing.

We are in the process of ironing out the details, but if you want to retain our services we will charge half of what we would charge when these services become publicized in August. For less than the cost of hiring an outside investigator for one case, we will help as many victims as possible build strong judicial cases. We believe this will increase the numbers of cases that are heard, help advocates prove there is a problem on their campus, and by removing much of this responsibility from the advocate it will increase the trust and support between them and the victim. Contact DaveK@CollegeJudicialConsultants.com with any question or to discuss costs.

When I was in law school I took a negotiations course taught by Professor Charles Craver. In it he told us that the best way to win a negotiation is to have your opponent negotiate against himself. As an example he said that when he bought a new car he went to each dealer of that car and told them to write down their best price and put it in a sealed envelope. At the end of the day, he told them that he would open the envelopes and whoever had the lowest price would sell a car. The point was the salesmen would try to determine the lowest a competitor would go and then try and beat it to make the sale. One salesman would sell a car, but the real winner was Craver.

When student organizations respond to administration concerns, they are the salesmen in the scenario. The administration can say “we have a zero tolerance for hazing. You, the Greek community, need to do something about it or we will!”

So the Greek leaders, exemplifying self-governance, sit down and hash out a plan to combat hazing (something that every single IFC/NPC/NPHC/MGC is already doing) and restore administrative confidence. Once that’s done, the plan is submitted and there are usually some concessions of autonomy in an attempt to retain what they think they can and get themselves out of the spotlight. The administration then takes the plan, reads it, and says something vague about being impressed by the work done. Then he or she says that they agree with the concessions part but that some work was going to have to be done on the other parts. In other words, we appreciate all the stuff you gave up, now we want you to give up more.

This does not happen because administrators are intent on harming Greek life (usually.) It happens because these students think they’re problem solving and thus are responding to what they think the administration wants through research and compromise, but the administration is treating it like a negotiation, and the initial plan/report is their offer in the envelope. To the administrator it isn’t an action plan, but rather the “first offer.” (Lesson 2 was you never accept the first offer.)

I know the Fraternity and Sorority Life Task Force at Tennessee released a report last week and that schools like Central Florida are taking hard looks at Greek life. I believe that if there is a systemic issue that it should be addressed, but I don’t think students should accidentally give up the farm to do so. So if you are working on an issue at the “request” of administration try to do the following:

Nail down the specific concerns, with examples. Do not address more than you have to.

Make sure any report makes includes information about comparable groups (e.g. Greek life on other campuses, residential life on your campus) to help add perspective.

Connect any concessions made with the benefits given so that rejecting a benefit takes the concessions off the table.

If you keep in mind that you’re in a negotiation and not in a partnership, you will protect yourself and your community much better. Remember, the car dealership made out (school), Craver made out (administrator), and only the salesman was worse off.

Have you had a similar or completely different experience? Tell us your story!